WACO, Texas — In March, new Baylor head coach Matt Rhule fired an operations staffer because of inappropriate texts to a teenager. That move came one month after firing an assistant strength coach arrested in a prostitution sting.

Rhule knew the biggest challenge he stepped into at Baylor would be changing a culture in wake of the sexual assault scandal under Art Briles, but these two staffers were people he had hired. Rhule was at a new school in a new state, still unfamiliar with his surroundings, and things were a little rocky.

So he called his father.

“I just kind of need you to come down here,” Rhule told his dad.

===

At 7:20 a.m. on a typically warm Wednesday in August, Denny Rhule turns the corner of the hallway in Baylor’s athletic building. He’s wearing a black State College High School Physical Education windbreaker to go with his white hair and big smile.